There was a time, not so very long ago, when you would go on Facebook or other social media to escape.  It was a place where, depending on your demographic, you could reasonably expect to be inundated with photos of parties, vacations, weddings, kids, or maybe even grandkids, but certainly no shortage of kittens.  There were always, reliably, videos of adorable kittens (unless, like me, you’re allergic to cats and therefore immune to their charms).  But it was undeniably an escapist effort to evade reality for a few brief minutes (or hours) while avoiding work and seeing what your friends, vague acquaintances, or that girl from Argentina you once hooked up with were up to.

The last year has changed all that.  The experience of checking your Facebook feed is undeniably, viscerally different.  And decidedly more emotionally exhausting and draining.

During the last electoral cycle, and in large part due to everyone’s favorite reality-buffoon-turned-tiny-tyrant, politics began steadily creeping onto our walls and into our posts and eventually into our collective consciousness at a steady, almost martial clip.  It started with the odd, sporadic post in which you indicated your support for a chosen candidate or side, but you probably did so hesitantly.  You might have been unsure about annoying your friends or seeming overly partisan.  Was Facebook really the place for politics, you might have wondered?  I certainly did.  Twitter somehow always seemed more appropriate, given that it always had a more news and political bent.  Then the pledges of allegiance grew to posts of petitions, and the armies began to muster.  Did this friend really support that candidate?  Was that even possible?  I thought I liked that girl or guy.  Then the links to articles followed and with them the comments sections, in which opposing battalions staked their respective claims and defended their territories.  We went from mild assertions of support one day to the fierce with-me-or-against-me, hell-or-high-water, well-just-unfriend-my-ass declarations seemingly only a few weeks later.  Facebook has, at times, become decidedly uncivil and intentionally provocative, and it now appears to be a potential political minefield every time you express an opinion.

Certainly, the increasingly hostile and vituperative tenor of the campaign fueled this, but there was something more at work.  Our very identities became tied to our walls and the post we made and the allegiances we declared.  Our residual political self-image may have always been there, but it felt like we more often avoided, rather than charged headfirst into, these delicate confrontations with friends and family members alike.  I’ve often been asked in the last few months how I can continue to engage and attempt to debate civilly with friends whose views some of my other friends find abhorrent.  I’m pretty sure that I’m far from a model of decorum and civility online, but I always try to remember the person I’m talking to on the other end of the discussion.  I try to see past the politics to see my best friend from second grade, or the adopted dad who invited me to every holiday at his house for four years when I was in the military, or the headmaster who gave me my first international teaching job.  And remember that these people were, and still are, my good friends.

Though I’m making it sound easy, it is in truth far from it.  There are times that I really want to go off on people.  And I certainly have.  It’s a lot easier to go after friends of friends who I don’t know and with whom I don’t have the aforementioned history or context.  I’ll readily admit that I may have been too fast and loose with terms like xenophobe and misogynist.  It just feels so fucking good to claim the moral high ground.  And righteous anger is an exhilarating feeling.  Do I still think I’m right?  You bet your ass I do.  But I’m willing to bet that many of my friends with opposing viewpoints feel similarly.

I still have yet to unfriend anyone, mostly because I think that it’s an entirely unproductive way to exchange ideas, but I can definitely see the immediate appeal and short-term gratification.  I’m also sure that my continual stream of partisan posts has gotten me unfollowed (if not unfriended) by certain friends or extended family members who aren’t of my political persuasion.  Which again, is fine—that’s their prerogative.  I’m certainly not going to stop.  I just hope I can continue to engage in a respectful way and not lose my temper as I have a few times.

While I haven’t done a formal statistical analysis, I’d say that approximately 75% of my friends who are active on Facebook have ideological leanings similar to my own, with 20% more divided or moderate, and 5% vehemently opposed.  I’m guessing that most people, by virtue of the geographical, educational, and professional ties that shape our respective networks, share a broadly similar division.  But it’s that 5% that still gives me a window on what the other side is thinking.  Hell, it reminds me that there really is another side, despite what my news feed, NYT alerts, and litany of podcasts (Pod Save America and Five Thirty-Eight chief among them) tell me.

While I can’t imagine that I’ll change my mind anytime soon about the current administration or any of the number of core democratic principles I believe it has betrayed, I have to continually remind myself that I have good friends on the other side of the ideological divide.  That these are smart people, as attached to their convictions as I and as committed to seeing them through as I.  Facebook, for better or worse, is no longer the place to simply post selfies (that’s Instagram).  Since I learned about the site in 2006 (when my students in Shanghai created a mocking/loving Facebook page called Gelfeld Smells), the site has been a boon for me personally since it’s allowed me to keep in contact with a host of friends in disparate parts of the globe.  But if it’s going to retain that utility, I’m going to have to realize that there are benefits and drawbacks to continual political postings.  That there is a residual weariness on all fronts.  That maybe a funny anecdote, ridiculous vacation photos, or a self-deprecating post every now again is every bit as acceptable and welcome as it was six months or a year ago.  Anyone who knows me knows that I won’t stop making political posts.  But that doesn’t mean I shouldn’t realize the emotional exhaustion on both sides and post a goddamn kitten video everyone once in a while.